Виктор Пелевин - Buddha's Little Finger

‘I do not understand what you mean.’

‘Shall I show you?’ asked Chapaev.

‘Yes, do.’

He swayed to one side, thrust his hand under the table and pulled out his nickel-plated Mauser. I barely managed to grab hold of his wrist in time.

‘All right, all right. Just don’t shoot the bottle.’

‘Right you are, Petka. Let’s have a drink instead.’

Chapaev filled the glasses and then became thoughtful. It was as though he was searching for the words he needed.

‘In actual fact.’ he said eventually, ‘for the moonshine there is no saucer, and no glass, and no bottle - there’s nothing but itself. That’s why everything that can appear or disappear is an assemblage of empty forms which do not exist until they are assumed by the moonshine. Pour it into a saucer and that’s hell, pour it into a cup and you’ve got heaven. But you and me are drinking out of glasses, and that makes us people, Petka. D’you follow me?’

There was another loud bang outside. I no longer had to go over to the window to see the reflected crimson glow flickering in the glass.

‘By the way, about hell,’ I said, ‘I cannot remember whether I told you or not. Do you know why these weavers have left us alone for so long?’

‘Why?’

‘Because they believe quite sincerely that you have sold your soul to the devil.’

‘Do they now?’ Chapaev asked in amazement. ‘That’s fascinating. But who sells the soul?’

‘How do you mean?’

‘Well, they say - he’s sold his soul to the devil, or, he’s sold his soul to God. But who is the person who sells it? He must be different from the thing he sells in order to be able to sell it, mustn’t he?’

‘You know, Chapaev,’ I said, ‘my Catholic upbringing will not allow me to joke about such things.’

‘I understand.’ said Chapaev. ‘I know where these rumours come from. There was one person who came here to see me in order to ask how he could sell his soul to the devil. A certain Staff Captain Lambovsky. Are you acquainted?’

‘We met in the restaurant.’

‘I explained to him how it can be done, and he performed the entire ritual most punctiliously.’

‘And what happened?’

‘Nothing much. He didn’t suddenly acquire riches, or eternal youth either. The only thing that did happen was that in all the regimental documents the name «Lambovsky» was replaced by «Serpentovich».’

‘Why was that?’

‘It’s not good to go deceiving others. How can you sell what you haven’t got?’

‘Do you mean to tell me,’ I asked, ‘that Lambovsky has no soul?’

‘Of course not.’ said Chapaev.

‘And you?’

For a second or so Chapaev seemed to be gazing deep inside himself, and then he shook his head.

‘Do I have one?’ I asked.

‘No,’ said Chapaev.

My face must have betrayed my confusion, because Chapaev chuckled and shook me by the elbow.

‘Petka, neither I, nor you, nor Staff Captain Lambovsky have any sort of soul. It’s the soul that has Lambovsky, Chapaev and Petka. You can’t say that everyone has a different soul and you can’t say everyone has the same soul. If there is anything we can say about it, it’s that it doesn’t exist either.’

‘I really do not understand a single word in all of that.’

‘That’s the problem, Petka… That’s where Kotovsky made his mistake. Remember that business with the lamp and the wax?’

‘Yes.’

‘Kotovsky understood that there is no form, what he didn’t understand is that there is no wax either.’

‘Why is there not?’

‘Because, Petka - listen to me carefully now - because the wax and the moonshine can take on any form, but they themselves are nothing but forms too.’

‘Forms of what?’

‘That’s the trick, you see. They are forms about which all we can say is that there is nothing that assumes them. D’you follow? Therefore in reality there is no wax and there is no moonshine.’

For a second I seemed to be balancing on some kind of threshold, and then a heavy drunken dullness descended on me. It suddenly became very difficult to think.

‘There may not be any wax,’ I said, ‘but there is still half a bottle of moonshine.’

Chapaev stared at the bottle with murky eyes.

‘That’s true.’ he said. ‘But if you can only understand that it doesn’t exist either, I’ll give you the order from my own chest. And until I do give it to you, we won’t be leaving this place.’

We drank another glass and I listened for a while to the sounds of shooting outside; Chapaev paid absolutely no attention to it all.

‘Are you really not afraid?’ I asked.

‘Why, Petka, are you afraid of something?’

‘A little,’I said.

‘What of?’

‘Death.’ I answered, before pausing. ‘Or rather, not death itself, but… I do not know. I want to save my consciousness.’

Chapaev laughed and shook his head.

‘Have I said something funny?’

‘That’s a good one, Petka. I didn’t expect that of you. You mean you went into battle with thoughts like that in your head every time? It’s the same as a scrap of newspaper lying under a street lamp and thinking that it wants to save the light it’s lying in. What d’you want to save your consciousness from?’

I shrugged. ‘From non-existence.’

‘But isn’t non-existence itself an object of consciousness?’

‘Now we’re back to sophistry again,’ I said. ‘Even if I am «i scrap of newspaper that thinks that it wants to save the light in which it is lying, what difference does it all make if I really do think that, and it all causes me pain?’

‘The scrap of newspaper can’t think. It’s just got the words written across it in bold italics: «I want to save the light of the street lamp.» And written beside that is: «Oh what pain, what terrible suffering…» Come on, Petka, how can I explain it to you? This entire world is a joke that God has told to himself. And God himself is the same joke too.’

There was an explosion outside, so close this time that the panes of glass in the window rattled audibly. I distinctly heard the rustling sound of shrapnel ripping through the leaves outside.

‘I tell you what, Vasily Ivanovich,’ I said, ‘why don’t we finish up with the theory and try to think of something practical.’

‘To be practical, Petka, I can tell you that if you’re afraid, 11 ien both of us are for the high jump. Because fear always at-11 acts exactly what it’s afraid of. But if you’re not afraid, then you become invisible. The best possible camouflage is indif-lerence. If you’re genuinely indifferent, none of those who can cause you harm will even remember you exist - they just won’t think about you. But if you go squirming about on your «hair the way you are now, in five minutes’ time we’ll have a roomful of those weavers in here.’

I suddenly realized that he was right, and I felt ashamed of my nervousness, which appeared particularly pitiful against (lie foil of his magnificent indifference. Had not I myself only recently refused to leave with Kotovsky? I was here because I had chosen to be, and it was simply foolish to waste what might be the final minutes of my life on anxiety and fear. I looked at Chapaev and thought that in essence I had never discovered anything at all about this man.

Tell me, Chapaev, who are you in reality?’

‘Better tell yourself, Petka, who you are in reality. Then you’ll understand all about me. But you just keep on repeating «me, me, me», like that gangster in your nightmare. What does that mean - «me»? What is it? Try taking a look for yourself.’

‘I want to look, but…’

‘If you want to look, why do you keep on looking at that «me» and that «want» and that «look», instead of at yourself?’